


A Strange Promise

by Northern_Lady



Category: Doctor Strange (2016), Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Friendship, Future Fic, Homelessness, Hugs, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Romance, Loneliness, Nightmares, Oaths & Vows, One Shot, Panic Attacks, Past Abuse, Past Rape, Past Violence, Protectiveness, Rape Aftermath, Rape Recovery, Xenophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-07
Packaged: 2019-10-23 02:18:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17674538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Northern_Lady/pseuds/Northern_Lady
Summary: Nebula has been in hiding and is forced to seek out help from the only person she can trust to help her.





	1. Chapter 1

Nebula walked with her hood up and her hands in her pockets. It wasn’t exactly a cold day. She knew it was probably blood loss making her cold.The other reason for keeping her hood up was the fact that she had been on earth long enough to know that humans didn’t really like her. Bleeker street was no different than any other place on this planet. Nebula kept her head down and tried to not be noticed. 

She reached the house she was looking for and knocked on the door. 

“Nebula?” The man said as he opened it. 

“I am sorry to bother you Doctor. I need your help.” Nebula pushed her jacket aside revealing a pool of blood and a stab wound in her left shoulder. She was pretty sure her face was bruised too. 

Doctor Steven Strange opened the door wider and stepped aside to let her in. “What happened?” He asked as he brought her to the kitchen and pulled out a chair. 

Nebula shrugged off her jacket and took the offered chair. “I got into a fight with a gang.” 

“No, I mean why isn’t this healing?” He washed his hands quickly and turned to tear open the fabric around her wound. “I thought you had nanites to aid in your healing.” 

“I did. They got switched off. Can you fix this or not?” 

He took a closer look at the injury, rinsing it off with a bottle of saline water before giving a reply. “Doesn’t look like a knife wound. What were you stabbed with?” 

“A broken glass bottle,” she told him, not wanting to recount the fight or mention her less visible injuries. 

“A broke-“ he cut himself off and shook his head. “There could be glass in the wound. You need surgery. In a hospital.” He opened a drawer and tore open a package of gauze pads and placed it over the wound. “Hold that there.” 

“So you can’t do it?” Nebula asked, holding the gauze like he asked. “They said you were the best surgeon around once.” 

“I don’t have any equipment here. I would at least need a sterile table and anesthetic.” 

“I don’t need anesthetic. I will be fine.” 

“Why not just go to a hospital? They can help you there. What’s with all the cloak and dagger for the past year?” He asked, referring to the way she had remained in hiding ever since Thanos was defeated a year earlier. 

“I have my reasons,” she said bitterly. “Just tell me, if I don’t go to a hospital, will I die?” 

Strange hesitated to reply. The gauze she held was already soaked with blood. “Fine. I need you to take off your shirt, take your bra strap off of that left shoulder and lie down on the kitchen table.” 

Nebula did as he asked. Steven turned away while she removed her shirt and when he turned to face her he had ready a bottle of iodine disinfectant. He stopped short on seeing she had been injured even further than she had led him to believe. Her long tunic shirt had hung down to her thighs before. Now that it was gone he could see not only a great deal of bruising on her ribs but a pool of blood between her legs and scratch marks on much of her visible skin. 

“Nebula did that gang rape you?” He asked. There wasn’t time to put the question to her more gently. She was losing a lot of blood and he needed to know why, now. 

“Can you fix my shoulder or not?” She asked through gritted teeth. There was pain in her tone as she avoided his question entirely. 

“It won’t matter if I don’t stop the rest of the bleeding. We need to remove the rest of your clothes,” he said and she slapped his hand away before he could even try. “Nebula…” he continued in what he hoped was a calming tone. 

Nebula turned and made an attempt at getting off the table. She only managed to roll off and land on the floor on her face. Steven went around to other side and found her on her knees, her hands on the back of a chair as she struggled to get to her feet. 

“You came here for help. Let me help you,” he insisted and he simply picked her up and put her back on the table. Nebula was too weak to resist him. “Look, I don’t have any anesthetic but there is a spell I can use that will keep you asleep for a few hours. Let me use it and stop all the bleeding.” 

“I don’t want to die,” Nebula gave as a reply. 

Steven decided that would have to be close enough to consent to operate and he went ahead and performed the spell. 

***

Nebula awoke in an unfamiliar bed in an unfamiliar room. There was pain in her shoulder and pain from her attack but the fear of being in an unfamiliar place made her ignore the pain and she gasped and sat bolt upright. 

“Take it easy,” Doctor Strange sat in a chair at her bedside. 

“I’m alive,” Nebula said, remembering what had brought her to him in the first place. 

“You are, and you’ll stay that way if you get some rest and manage to avoid infection.” 

“Unlikely,” Nebula muttered tossing aside the covers on the bed. She found that she was wearing a pair of blue drawstring hospital pants and a large black t-shirt. These were Steven’s clothes if she had to guess. 

“Where do you think you’re going?” He asked her as she made a noise of pain from all the movement. 

“Somewhere else. I might have been followed. I need to go.” 

Steven shook his head. “I did not just spend hours trying to save your life just so you can go out there and throw it away. Stay. Rest. You’re not going anywhere.” 

“But…” Nebula protested. 

“No buts. Back in bed.” 

Nebula didn’t really care for being told what to do but she had no place else to go. Reluctantly, she did as the doctor said and lay back against the pillow and covered herself with the blankets. 

“Good. Now are you ready to tell me what happened?” He asked. 

She didn’t want to tell him. She didn’t want to talk about it but the man had just saved her life. She knew she had to try. “You know there are gangs who are Xenophobic? They hunt aliens.” 

Steven hadn’t know this. The realization made him sick to his stomach. “And what about your nanites? Who switched them off?” 

“That was SHIELD. Just after we defeated Thanos when we all had debriefing they did it without my permission. They told me since I was one of only a few people in the world who could wield the gauntlet… they wanted to take my eye and my arm too.I fought my way out before they got the chance.” 

“They thought you were a threat. That’s why you’ve been hiding all this time.” At least it made sense to him now. “That’s why you wouldn’t go to a hospital.”

“I didn’t have a choice. SHIELD monitors the hospital and with my blue skin it only takes one nurse violating privacy and telling someone she treated an alien and the gangs will come after me again.” 

“So why haven’t any of us seen you for a year? Seems like you could have used our help. Where have you been hiding?” 

“Here. On Bleeker Street,” she admitted reluctantly. “I couldn’t risk open contact because SHIELD is watching but without my nanites if I ever got badly injured...I thought…” 

“You thought you should be near a doctor who wouldn’t report you to SHIELD or reveal you to the gangs,” he finished for her. “You did the right thing. You could have just come and spoken with me before now though. There was no need to hide.” 

“And if I had and SHIELD was monitoring and came for me, what would you have done?” Nebula asked him. 

“Not let them take you or your arm or your eye. I still won’t.” 

Nebula let out a breath. “You won’t?”

“No. And there’s no need to worry about those gangs either. Stay here. Recover. And if you want to stay even after that...well, I don’t think it’s safe for you to go.” 

“Are you serious?” Nebula could hardly breathe. It seemed like her entire life had been lived in fear. He was offering her safety for the first time that she could remember. 

“Perfectly,” He said without hesitation. “Stay. I don’t want to have to operate on you again. Stay and I won’t have to.” 

Nebula had never been one for tears so at first she didn’t even know what the wet stuff on her face even was. 

“I’ll get you some food,” Strange said and he left her alone. 

A short time later Nebula drank a mug of chicken broth and fell into a sound sleep. 

*** 

The next time Nebula woke it was dark in the room and more than anything she needed to use the bathroom. She tried to move and an immense amount of pain shot through her entire body. Great. This was not going to be easy. Between the pain and the darkness and the unfamiliar house this could be a very difficult trip to the bathroom. 

Nebula bit back a cry of pain as she sat up and placed her feet on the floor. She groped in the darkness and her hand found a bedside table. She used it to help steady herself as she attempted to stand. It didn’t work. This time Nebula did let out a cry of pain and before she could steady herself she collapsed into a heap on the floor. 

Her every attempt to get up after that ended in failure. She couldn’t use her left arm in the effort to pull herself to her feet. The pain in her ribs and inside her body from the rape made her efforts useless. She considered trying to crawl but knew that putting weight on her shoulder wouldn’t work out well for her. She momentarily thought about yelling for help but quickly dismissed the idea. She wasn’t quite that helpless yet. And so she stayed where she was on floor next to the bed. 

It was some hours later when Steven found her. 

“Nebula?” The sound of his voice woke her up. The room was dimly lit and he was knelt down by her side. 

Nebula have a groan of pain from trying to move yet again. 

“What happened? You tried to get up?” He asked. 

“It didn’t work out so well did it? I don’t know where the bathroom is anyway.” 

“I’m gonna have pick you up and take you there, okay?” He said and he didn’t wait her her to reply. 

Nebula expected a great deal of pain when he picked her up. There was pain for sure but there was also something else that she did not expect. There was comfort too. Nebula let her head rest against his shoulder for the short distance from her room to the bathroom. He set her on her feet in front of the toilet and waited for her to steady herself before letting go.,

“There probably will be pain. If you need help getting up I’ll be right outside the door.” 

Nebula managed to get through the entire process unaided. She even crossed the room to the sink and washed her hands. Steven was waiting outside the door like he promised. He picked her up and carried her back to the bedroom. As he set her down she got a grip on his shirt and she couldn’t bring herself to let go. She couldn’t ask him to stay either. The words wouldn’t come to her. All she could do was hold on tightly. 

“Nebula, you can let go now,” he told her. 

“I can’t…” she sobbed the words. 

“I’m not going anywhere. I’ll stay. You can let go.” 

Nebula tried to make herself let go and couldn’t do it. She found that it was difficult to breathe. 

Instead of trying to leave Steven moved her further to the far side of the bed. He sat down next to her. She still didn’t let go of his shirt. “Nebula, you’re having a panic attack. Just try to breathe. I am not going anywhere.” 

It took a long time for her to be able to breathe calmly and come back to reality. “I’m sorry,” she sobbed, forcing herself to let go of him. 

“You have nothing to be sorry for. I shouldn’t have left you alone. That was a mistake on my part. You’re injured and traumatized. So if it helps to hold on to me, feel free.” 

Nebula turned and simply hugged him. He wrapped his arms around her and hugged her in return, letting her fall asleep against him. 

Steven awoke in the morning to the sound of someone knocking on his front door downstairs. Nebula still slept against him. She seemed almost relaxed until he moved a little to try and go answer the door and then she startled awake and stiffened with fear. 

“Relax,” he told her gently. “It’s just someone at the front door. I’ll take care of it.” 

“What if it’s SHIELD?”

“Then I’ll make this room invisible. They can come search the house but they won’t find you.” 

“Okay,” she agreed, letting him go. 

It wasn’t SHIELD. It was just his neighbor Frank asking to borrow a spoonfull of sugar for his wife’s tea. They were all out of sugar and Frank didn’t want to make the wife wait for as long as it would take to wait through the supermarket checkout line. Steven gave Frank the sugar and returned to Nebula. 

Nebula looked relieved to see him return. Relieved and guilty. “I’m sorry. I am sorry about last night and about being such a coward. I haven’t cried about anything in years and that was…” 

“That was entirely appropriate,” he told her honestly. “I don’t know what happened to you as a daughter of Thanos but I can’t imagine that your childhood was a happy one. Then to spend this past year defenseless in a world where you needed to defend yourself, I am surprised you are even mentally stable. You have every right to shed a few tears or a lot of tears.” 

“Then...thanks…” It has not been what she had been expecting to hear. She hadn’t even realized she needed permission to cry or to show weakness by panicking the way she had but apparently she had needed to hear from someone that it was okay. 

Doctor Strange hardly left Nebula’s bedside all day. He brought her to the bathroom, gave her food, and kept her company while she slept. She was hardly awake for most of the day but was thankful that each time she woke up he was still there. Late that afternoon she woke and felt as if she could perhaps stay awake for a little while. 

“You look more alert this time,” Strange said as she sat up in the bed and propped a couple of pillows up behind her. “How is your pain level?” 

“No worse than when I lost my arm,” she replied. 

“How did that happen anyway,” he asked, passing her a couple of pills from a bottle on the bedside stand and a glass of water. 

“Thanos,” She told him. “He made Gamora and I fight as part of our training. Gamora would always win and when she did Thanos would upgrade me.” 

“So it wasn’t the result of an accident?” Steven didn’t know why he surprised. Thanos was a monster. He should have expected nothing less. 

“No. It was no accident and I didn’t get to have any of this anesthetic you mentioned before.” 

“No wonder you were so determined to kill him,” he said. 

“I wanted to kill him before all of that. I watched his men murder my parents and destroy half my home world when I was seven.” 

“If you could go back there now, to your home world, would you want to go?” 

Nebula thought about his words for a moment. “They wouldn’t want me there. It was only twenty years ago that Thanos invaded them and took me with him. The people there would see me as a traitor. I served Thanos for many years. My homeworld has no place for me. Earth really doesn’t either.” 

“Look, I know SHIELD is a problem and so are those xenophobic gangs but there are a lot of people on this planet who would be perfectly willing to accept you. There can be a place for you here, not just on this planet but here on Bleeker street if you want it.” 

“I didn’t expect you would be so nice. This whole time I expected you probably would help me if were dying but I didn’t think you’d offer to let me stay or just sit with me because I was freaking out. I was wrong.” 

“No you were right. I can be rather harsh with people. I probably still will be in the future. Asking you to stay doesn’t change the fact that I’ll probably continue to be an outspoken jerk in a couple of days. The truth is, I do have a little compassion somewhere. I guess you helped me find it.” 

***

For three days Doctor Strange stayed at Nebula’s bedside. He learned more about her history with Thanos and about her time spent homeless on earth. He told her about how he came to practice the mystic arts. She didn’t have any more panic attacks but she also didn’t want to be left alone. So he stayed with her, sleeping in a recliner at her bedside and checking on her multiple times by day, sometimes sitting and talking to her for hours. 

On the fourth day she finally felt ready to venture out of the bedroom on her own. She went to the bathroom and then wandered around the house a little until she found him in the library. 

“You’re up. How are you feeling?” he asked, looking up from his book. 

“I’m okay. It was a long way down here. I saw this house so many times from the outside and never realized it was so big.” 

“It took me a while to get used to when I moved in here,” Steven told her/ 

“I was thinking, I need to do something to earn my way here. I can’t just ask you to feed me and shelter me for free.” 

“Well, you can’t exactly go out and find a job without being spotted. Besides, I’m not suffering from a lack of resources. I can afford to let you stay. It’s not a problem.” 

“Maybe not for you but…” 

“I could ask you to clean my house but I think you’d be miserable as a housekeeper. The job wouldn’t suit you.” 

“I would do it anyway. Thanos asked me to be an assassin and I don’t think that suited me either. I preferred to spend my time in the engine room of his ship. Mechanical things suit me. Housekeeping I could at least tolerate.” 

“Actually, there’s a leak in the sink of one of the upstairs bathrooms. I’ve been ignoring it for a week. Maybe you could fix it?” 

“I could do that,” Nebula agreed, thankful that she had at least found a way to make herself useful. 

***

Another week passed and Steven had returned to sleeping in his own room since Nebula was mobile enough to get out of bed on her own. She sometimes had nightmares and awoke in a panic. She hated to admit to herself that she missed his presence at her bedside. Once again she woke startled and this time heard knocking on the front door. She heard footsteps and voices as Steven went to answer it. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Steven said. “The last time I saw Nebula was just after we defeated Thanos.” 

“Well, it’s SHIELD protocol that we need to search the house anyway,” A man’s voice said. 

“Feel free. You won’t find anything,” Steven said. 

More footsteps entered the house. Nebula forced herself to remain still and quiet as the sounds spread throughout the house. Agents went past the door to her room multiple times but never once looked in or saw her. Steven had somehow made the room invisible as he had promised. It was an hour before they gave up their search and left. 

“You okay?” Steven said from the doorway. 

Nebula nodded, trying to keep from showing how shaken she actually was. “I’m fine,” she said in spite of being hardly able to breathe. 

He crossed the room and sat down on the bed next to her, offering her a hug which she willingly accepted. He held her until the panic subsided. 

“Thank you…” she whispered as she finally began to calm. 

“For what?” he asked. “For not turning you in? It was a simple spell to hide you. It wasn’t a problem.” 

“It would have been simple to turn me in too,” she said with a sniffle. “It would be simple for you to just go back to bed and not sit here with me.” 

“Nebula…” he sighed. “It’s not as simple as you think. Before Thanos, I swore an oath to help people as a surgeon and I swore an oath to protect the time stone. It gave me purpose to have someone to save or to protect. I’ve spent a year not knowing what I’m supposed to do with my life. Then you showed up and you very nearly died when I was operating on you and I swore that if you lived I would protect you from whoever it was that had hurt you. It’s not simple because I have promises to keep.” 

She lifted her head and met his eyes. “You didn’t promise to sit here with me though,” she pointed out. 

“No,” he agreed. “I do that because I want to.” 

“That’s good, because I want you to.” 

Nebula relaxed against him and the two of them eventually both fell asleep where they sat.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally a one shot but I kinda just kept going.

For three months she had been living at his house. For three nights she had been sleeping in his bed. It had happened both suddenly and gradually. Steven had known from the moment that she arrived at his door, injured and broken, that his life was about to change but he had never guessed to what degree. 

Nebula slept next to him unaware that he was already awake. Her head rested against his arm. She was so often touching him lately that he wasn’t surprised she still touched him while she slept. It had probably begun when he had hugged her to get her through her panic attacks but those had subsided weeks ago or had at least become far less frequent. Now she simply found excuses to touch him in passing during the day. He couldn’t say that he minded. He liked her company and her intelligence and he liked her nearness. He hoped that she would never leave even though he wasn’t ready to say so out loud. He was almost sure that she felt the same. 

His cell phone pinged on the bedside stand and Steven reached over to read the text message that had been sent. It was from Bruce Banner. 

_I figured it out._

Steven sent a quick reply. “How soon can you do it?” 

_That depends. Is Nebula at your house or still in hiding somewhere?_

Steve hesitated to reply. He hadn’t told Bruce that Nebula was with him. He had simply sent a blood sample. Bruce had of course figured it out based on the one sample. The only thing to do at this point was ask Nebula. He reached over and placed a hand on her shoulder, her right shoulder just in case the left one was still sore. 

Nebula slowly opened her eyes and responded to being awake by moving closer to him. 

“I have a confession to make,” he said as he enfolded her into a hug. 

“What confession?” she asked, curios rather than concerned. 

“I sent a sample of your blood to Bruce Banner. I was hoping he could figure out how to switch your nanites back on.” 

Nebula pulled away just enough to meet his eyes. Steven couldn’t tell if she were angry or not. 

“Can he?” she asked. 

Steven nodded. “He can. He’d need to meet with us. He suspects you’re here but he doesn’t know it for sure.” 

Nebula thought about his words for a moment. “Do you think he can be trusted to keep it from SHIELD?” 

“I think so. That doesn’t mean SHIELD isn’t actively monitoring him though. We’d still need to be careful.” 

“We should do it,” Nebula said. 

Steven sent another text. “Can you meet me at the corner deli? 9AM? Alone?” 

_Will do._

“I’m gonna talk to him about it in person in a public place,” he told Nebula as he started to move to get up for the day. 

“Wait,” she said, hanging onto him to keep him from leaving. “If I have my nanintes back does that mean…? I mean, won’t really be in danger anymore…” 

Her words confused him for a few seconds and then they suddenly made sense. “No. It isn’t like that. Just because you’ll able to defend yourself doesn’t change anything.” 

“But I’ll be able to defend myself and I may never be ready for...I might never be ready. Are you sure you’re not gonna get tired of that?” she asked rather vaguely. 

There was no need for her to explain herself. He knew. “Nebula, I knew from the beginning that after what that gang did to you, you might not be ready for a physical relationship for a long time, or maybe never at all. I’m telling you right now that I don’t care. What we have already is enough. If you get your nanites back, I’ll still want you here. Will you still want to be here?” 

“More than anything,” Nebula said, her voice breaking. 

Steven didn’t reply to that. He simply pulled her closer and kissed her. She melted into his kisses as she always did and pressed herself closer against him. He was pretty sure, based on how she reacted to him over the past weeks, that given enough time Nebula would overcome her fears of intimacy. But, he had been telling her the truth. Even if she never learned to get past it, he was okay with what they already did share. She was perfectly willing to meet his needs in other ways and it was enough to be close to her. 

They eventually ended their kisses and Steven left the house to go meet Bruce at the deli. He entered the deli and took a quick look around at the few tables near the big glass window. He very nearly turned around and walked out the door when he saw that Bruce was not alone. Tony Stark sat next to him. 

“I thought I asked you to come alone,” Steven said as he sat down across from the two of them. “Was I not clear enough?” 

“Hey, I know we’ve had our differences,” Tony spoke up defensively, “But Nebula saved my life. I need to know if she’s okay.” 

Steven sighed, trying to put aside his antagonism. “She’s fine now. She wasn’t fine back when I sent that blood sample.” 

“What happened? How did her nanites get switched off?” Bruce asked with concern. 

“SHIELD shut them off. They decided she was a threat,” Strange explained. 

“Well with the Gauntlet locked away in their vault and Nebula being one of maybe three people who can wield it, I can see their line of thinking,” Tony said. 

Steven glared at him. “Shutting off her nanites made her defenseless.” 

“I wasn’t saying it was the right thing to do,” Tony continued. “Besides, she’s got other skills. She was pretty good with a gun if I remember right.” 

“She doesn’t have any guns. And she’s an alien with blue skin and cybernetic enhancements. Who is going to sell her a gun if she wanted one?” 

“Fair point,” Tony said. “That’s why we’re here though. To get her nanites back online and none of that will be an issue. She won’t need to hide out at your house anymore. That is where she’s hiding, right?” 

Steven ignored the question. He still didn’t trust that SHIELD wasn’t backing Tony or sending him as a spy. Bruce was no spy but Tony very well could be. “What do I have to do? Is there some injection? Computer program?” 

“It’s an injection,” Bruce told him. “I didn’t bring it with me.” 

Steven sat up a little straighter and looked the two of them over. “Why not? What are you two really up to?” 

“We’re not up to anything,” Tony said plainly. “We’re not connected with SHIELD if that’s what you’re worried about. We just want to see for ourselves that Nebula is okay before go any further with this.” 

“What, do you think she’s some sort of hostage?” Strange asked, insulted. 

“You sent that blood sample three months ago. I think it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense that you’ve been sheltering Nebula all this time just out of the goodness of your heart,” Tony said. “It doesn’t fit in with your agenda.” 

“And what exactly is my agenda?” Strange asked, still not liking where this conversation had headed. 

“I don’t know. Something more egotistical than secretly sheltering one alien woman,” Tony continued. 

“I think you’re confused about which person in this room is egotistical,” Steven shot back at him. 

“Well, it certainly isn’t Brad at the cash register over there,” Tony said. 

“Guys...guys…” Bruce began. “Let’s just stick with the matter at hand here. Where is Nebula? And if she is with you, why is she there? And is she okay?” 

“Yes, she is okay!” Steven said. It irked him that in the end it wasn’t SHIELD that had pushed them to ask all these questions. These questions were fueled by his own reputation of being heartless. “You wanna know why she is staying with me? She showed up at my front door after she had been gang raped by twenty-three xenophobic assholes. At least there were twenty three that she remembers before she blacked out. There was a stab wound in her shoulder from a glass bottle, three broken ribs, and seventeen skin tears that needed stitches. It took nine hours of surgery to save her life. And after it was over she spent weeks dealing with panic attacks and nightmares. She still has them…” he trailed off a little sadly. 

Both Bruce and Tony looked disturbed by what they had just heard. 

“So…” Strange said with a sigh. “You give me the means to turn her nanites back on and if she wants to come visit with you after that then we’ll arrange it.” 

Tony nodded and Bruce reached into his pocket and took out a pen. “It’s not a pen. It’s a syringe.” he told Steven. “I actually did bring it just in case.” 

“Thank you,” Strange said, relieved. 

“Just...just give her a hug for me, alright?” Tony said, worry in his tone. 

“I will,” Steven agreed. 

***

A week later Nebula waited in the foyer of Steven’s house. Strange really had no interest in visiting with Stark and had decided to go run some errands while Nebula met with her guest. The knock in the door came and she opened it. Tony Stark stepped in and hugged her as soon as the door was closed. 

“I heard you’ve been through hell,” Tony said as he stepped away. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to help.” 

“I know...I would have called but, I know Fury talks to you sometimes and Natasha worked with them and I thought…” 

“No I get it,” Tony said. He understood. It saddened him but he understood. “Where’s Strange?” he asked taking a look around. “Not here? Maybe I could just go lean on the Cauldron of the Cosmos for old times sake?” 

“He’d never forgive me if I let you do that. Come to the kitchen. I have better food here than we had on the Benatar.” 

Tony followed Nebula to the kitchen and then he stopped short on seeing blood stains all over the kitchen floor. “Is that…?” 

“That’s my blood. From the night I first came here. There was a tile floor before. Steven had it torn up but there was still blood in the hardwood underneath. Someone’s coming in next week to put down all new flooring.” she barely even looked at it and instead occupied herself looking in the refrigerator. 

“That must bother you. Coming in here and seeing that every day?”

She shrugged. “It wasn’t exactly my first injury. I’ve lost blood before.” 

“Yeah, but this was different. I just hope you’re okay, being here with the bloodstains and your arrogant housemate.” 

Nebula closed the fridge and turned to face Tony. “You’re worried about me?” 

Tony shook his head as if to deny it and went ahead and spoke anyway. “I’ve been worried about you for a year. You went off the grid for a year. I kept watching all the news footage about the growing xenophobia and I kept wondering if someone had gotten to you. I am just glad that when they did get to you, Strange actually came through and kept you alive.” 

“Of course he did. He’s not...he’s not a bad person.” 

“You’re in love with him aren’t you?” Tony asked openly. He was mostly curious. 

“Is there something wrong with that?” she replied. 

“No, I’m just not sure I get it. I mean if it’s just ‘cause he saved your life, I think you could do better. Is the guy even nice to you or does he just hide in a closet and practice magic tricks all day?” Tony asked skeptically. 

“He is nice to me,” Nebula said, emotionally moved by the question. “But if I had told you that he wasn’t nice, what had you planned to do with that information?” 

“I would get you out of here. Strange has some pretty powerful magic but I have some power of my own. If you need out, you’d tell me right?” 

“He helped you defeat Thanos. Why do you dislike him so much?” 

“Just because we fought on the same side doesn’t make him a good guy. I barely know anything about him except that he is very powerful and very arrogant. You on the other hand are an alien on a strange planet without a lot of resources or options. I need to know that you are here because you want to be and not because you have to be,” Tony explained. 

“I want to be here,” Nebula told him sincerely. “Since I have been here, for the first time in my life I know what it feels like to be safe and to belong and to be loved. I promise you, Steven is good to me and he treats me better than I ever thought I deserved.” She crossed the room and placed her hand on his arm. “I thank you all the same for being willing to help me leave if I needed to leave. It means a great deal to me to have friends.” 

It was Tony’s turn to be affected by her words. He placed a hand on her shoulder. “As long as you’re happy, that’s all that matters.” 

“I am. I really am,” Nebula told him.


End file.
